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Traditionalist Communion

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Traditionalist Communion
Comunión Tradicionalista
Leaders Manuel Fal Conde
Founded 1869
Dissolved 1937
Merged into FET y de las JONS
Paramilitary wing Requetés
Ideology Carlism
Anti-liberalism
Integrism
Traditionalism
Federalism
Monarchism
Reactionism
Foralism
Political position Right-wing
Religion Catholicism
Party flag
Politics of Spain
Political parties
Elections

The Traditionalist Communion (Spanish: Comunión Tradicionalista, CT; Basque: Elkarte Tradizionalista, Catalan: Comunió Tradicionalista) was one of the names adopted by the Carlist movement as a political force since 1869.[1]

History

In October 1931, Carlist claimant to the Spanish throne Duke Jaime died. He was succeeded by the 82-year-old claimant Alfonso Carlos de Borbón, reuniting under him the Integrists led by Olazábal and the "Mellists". They represented a region-based Spanish nationalism with an entrenched identification of Spain and Catholicism. The ensuing radicalized Carlist scene overshadowed the "Jaimists" with a Basque inclination. The Basque(-Navarrese) Statute failed to take off over disagreements on the centrality of Catholicism in 1932, with the new Carlist party Comunión Tradicionalista opting for an open confrontation with the Republic. The Republic established a secular approach of the regime, a division of Church and state, as well as freedom of religion, as France did in 1905, an approach traditionalists fundamentally opposed.

The Comunión Tradicionalista (1932) showed an ultra-Catholic, anti-secular position, and plotted for a military takeover, while adopting far-right apocalyptic views and talking of a final clash with an alliance of alleged anti-Christian forces.[2]

The October 1934 Revolution cost the life of the Carlist deputy Marcelino Oreja Elósegui, with Manuel Fal Condé taking over from young Carlists clustering around the AET (Jaime del Burgo and Mario Ozcoidi) in their pursuit to overthrow the Republic. The Carlists started to prepare for an armed definite clash with the Republic and its different leftist groups. From the initial defensive Decurias of Navarre (deployed in party seats and churches), the Requeté grew into a well-trained and strongest offensive paramilitary group in Spain when Manuel Fal Condé took the reins. It numbered 30,000 red berets (8,000 in Navarre and 22,000 in Andalusia).[2]

When the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936 following the election of a coalition of socialist, communist, and anarchist parties, the Traditionalist Communion sided with the Spanish Nationalists, despite ideological differences with the Falangists, out of shared Catholicism and repression under the Republic. Seeking to unify all Nationalist Forces, General Francisco Franco announced that all political parties, other than FET y de las JONS, were dissolved, and the Traditionalist Communion ceased to exist.[3]

Ideology

Carlism is a reactionary, monarchist, and extremely Catholic ideology. It developed after King Ferdinand VII changed the succession laws by the Pragmatic Sanction of 1830, meaning Don Carlos would no longer become the next king. Its main tenets are "God, Country, and King", and it spawned many other political parties, the most notable of which was the Carlist Party of Euskal Herria, which was formed as an underground party during the fascist government and went on to run in the elections following the democratization of Spain.

Legacy

Carlism remained a scattered movement until the end of the dictatorship. While a fraction of the movement actively supported the Francoist regime, most of Carlists were forced to go underground.

The Traditionalist Communion was reorganised during the 1950s and 1960s in a situation of illegality and prohibition imposed in Francoist Spain to university and workers' organisations of non-integrated Carlism (Group of Traditionalist Students, AET at the university; Traditionalist Worker’s Movement, MOT) into the only Francoist party, with the support of prince Carlos Hugo, Duke of Parma.

In 1970, the Carlist Party was officially established by a Congress of the Carlist People in Arbonne, in which it adopted a program for the ideological change of Carlism towards self-management socialism and the conversion of the Carlist movement into a federal and democratic party of the masses on a class basis which aspired to a pact between the dynasty and the people to a socialist monarchy.

The socialistic turn of both Duke Carlos Hugo and his son Prince Carlos, Duke of Parma was rejected by the more right-wing factions of Carlism, under the leadership of Prince Sixtus Henry of Bourbon-Parma, who re-established the Traditionalist Communion in 1975. In 1986, the Communion, alongside two other right-wing Carlist parties, established the Traditionalist Carlist Communion, a political party which promotes the traditional version of Carlism, based upon integrism, foralism and reactionism.

Electoral Results

Election Seats +/- Pretender Chief
1869[4] 23 / 381 New Carlos María de Borbón y Austria-Este Ramón Cabrera
1871[4] 51 / 424 28 Francisco Javier Fernández de Henestrosa y Santisteban
April 1872[4][5] 38 / 424 13 Cándido Nocedal
August 1872[4] Abstained —
1873[4] —
1876[6] —
1879[6] —
1881[6] —
1884[6] —
1886[6] — Carlos María de Borbón y Austria-Este[7]
1891[6] 4 / 446 34 Enrique de Aguilera y Gamboa
1893[6] 8 / 447 4
1896[6] 10 / 447 2
1898[6] 6 / 447 4
1899[6] Abstained —
1901[6] 6 / 402 No change Matías Barrio y Mier
1903[6] 7 / 403 1
1905[6] 4 / 404 3 Jaime Pío de Borbón y Borbón-Parma
1907[6] 8 / 404 4
1910[8] 10 / 404 2 Bartolomé Feliu
1914[8][9] 6 / 408 4
1916[8] 9 / 409 3 Enrique de Aguilera y Gamboa
1918[8] 9 / 409 No change
1919[8] 8 / 409 1 Pascual Comín y Moya
1920[8] 6 / 409 2 Luis Hernando de Larramendi
1923[8] Abstained — José Selva y Mergelina
1931 4 / 470 2
1933[10] 20 / 473 16 Alfonso Carlos de Borbón y Austria-Este Tomás Domínguez Arévalo
1936[10] 9 / 473 11 Manuel Fal Conde

References

  1. Back to citation "Carlistas y Tradicionalistas (1868–1931)". historiaelectoral.com (in Spanish). Retrieved 31 December 2016.
  2. Back to citation occurrence 2.0 Back to citation occurrence 2.1 Preston, Paul (2013). The Spanish holocaust: inquisition and extermination in twentieth-century Spain. London: HarperPress. ISBN 978-0-00-638695-7. OCLC 810945953.
  3. Back to citation Carlism in the Spanish Rising of 1936.
  4. Back to citation occurrence 4.0 Back to citation occurrence 4.1 Back to citation occurrence 4.2 Back to citation occurrence 4.3 Back to citation occurrence 4.4 As the Catholic–Monarchist Communion
  5. Back to citation As part of the National Coalition
  6. Back to citation occurrence 6.00 Back to citation occurrence 6.01 Back to citation occurrence 6.02 Back to citation occurrence 6.03 Back to citation occurrence 6.04 Back to citation occurrence 6.05 Back to citation occurrence 6.06 Back to citation occurrence 6.07 Back to citation occurrence 6.08 Back to citation occurrence 6.09 Back to citation occurrence 6.10 Back to citation occurrence 6.11 Back to citation occurrence 6.12 Back to citation occurrence 6.13 Also known as the Carlist Party
  7. Back to citation Francisco Navarro Villoslada acted as representative
  8. Back to citation occurrence 8.0 Back to citation occurrence 8.1 Back to citation occurrence 8.2 Back to citation occurrence 8.3 Back to citation occurrence 8.4 Back to citation occurrence 8.5 Back to citation occurrence 8.6 Also known as the Jaimist Party
  9. Back to citation In coalition with the Integrist Party
  10. Back to citation occurrence 10.0 Back to citation occurrence 10.1 In coalition with Spanish Renovation